


Drop The Game

by trepidatingboarfetus



Category: Grand Theft Auto Series (Video Games), Grand Theft Auto V
Genre: Difficult Decisions, Drug Dealing, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Heavy Angst, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Psychological Drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:49:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27554137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trepidatingboarfetus/pseuds/trepidatingboarfetus
Summary: From the newly released The Lost Boys Volume One GTA V Fanzine!His sun is fading, and he doesn't know how to save him except to remove himself -- and all of them -- from the equation. At all costs. Even if it hurts. And he'll pay for it the rest of his life, but he's prepared to do anything to get them out of the game.
Relationships: Michael De Santa/Trevor Philips, Trevor Philips/Brad Snider
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Drop The Game

**Author's Note:**

> Remember me mentioning that I was busy working on a huge-ass GTA V Fanzine project with a friend and a bunch of kickass writers and artists? Well, it's out!! Go grab it! 
> 
> https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1wuK7xUDkj4vioR6lWT3eqaeelOHmMwv3
> 
> This came about actually because I was listening to a song by Flume and Chet Faker called Drop the Game, and I thought, "This would be a perfect way to wrap up the 'Zine," and I started writing it and then ran into a discussion on Tumblr about Michael. I know Michael gets a lot of hate for what he did to Trevor. As someone who relates a good deal to Trevor, I understand the snake emotions, but I also feel the loyalty Trevor feels underneath it all. The love. It doesn't just evaporate. And has anyone asked WHY Michael has sleeping issues. Why he drinks so goddamn much. Why he's needed anti-depressants apparently since they moved from North Yankton? He obviously had to make a heavy decision. Yeah, he got a fabulous lifestyle that he paid for in major depression and his own addictions. 
> 
> Both of these guys are flawed, and they both know it. And this became my take on why he had to leave. Why it became too much, why he tried to help in other ways when he saw what Trevor was becoming because of other influences. This is just my take, you don't have to agree, but I rather like it. It's poetic in any case.

_I’ve been seeing all, I’ve been seeing your soul_

_Give me things that I wanted to know_

_Tell me things that you’ve done_

_I’ve been feeling old, I’ve been feeling cold_

_You’re the heat that I know_

_See, you are my sun_

_Hush, I said there’s more to life than rush_

_Not gonna leave this place with us_

_Drop the game, it’s not enough_

Dave Norton was a decidedly sneaky and odd son-of-a-bitch even if he was a very quiet one. Michael felt itchy and uncomfortable whenever they were in the same room together even though lately, the more they met, those notions _were_ starting to fade away, but the ideas this guy was now slipping into his head through his silky honeyed voice grated on his nerves and made him want to vomit every horrid emotion out of his body onto the cheap stucco flooring of the Mexican restaurant where they were currently nursing beers that had long-since gone lukewarm and gnawing on chips with salsa made by the hands of some factory worker that was most definitely _not_ even remotely Latino.

“He’s a loose cannon with no one who cares for him, Michael,” Norton offered softly while twisting the glass handle for the beer in his hand, watching the amber liquid inside of it carefully, just as carefully as he inspected everything else with his snoopy eyes. “He’s got a file that fills several rooms already, all on his own because he’s been burning bridges since before you knew him.”

Michael stared indifferently at the bottle in front of him. “He has a mother, a goddamn brother.” 

Norton peered at him curiously and almost twitched his lips into a smile until the displeased look on the man’s face made him think better of it, so he sighed. “Even Charles Manson had a mother who loved him. So did Ted Bundy.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, that’s where we are with this?” He finished the rest of the beer, swilling it in his mouth to rinse the taste of despair and hatred for himself away, but no matter what he did, the painful sickness in the deepest part of his belly lay dormant like a growing beast of which he couldn’t rid himself even when he swallowed. He wiped his mouth with the back of his flannel coat and glared at Norton with contempt. “I’m not going to be a part of this shit. You can do whatever the fuck you want. Arrest me, I...I don’t...I really don’t give a fucking shit, you know?”

But he didn’t mean it, and he hated himself for that too. He was scared shitless even thinking it because his mind spiraled around Amanda and the kids back at the house, and goddamn, how had Trevor seen his downfall into a fucking coward before he ever had?

An unsteady hand reached out to grab his arm, slithered onto his skin, not unlike a snake, and the honey voice poured into his ears again with sweet words. “You know how it is, Michael. He’s a mad dog. He _has_ to be put down. You know as well as I do that he’s got his fingers in many pies these past months.” Stone cold eyes drooped upwards and stared him straight in the face. “You said so yourself. He’s been pushing you out, bringing Snider in more for these newer jobs.” Cold fingers stroked unpleasantly at his wrist, and Norton’s lips curled into a knowing grin. “Do you know what kind of jobs he’s been doing? Or are you too preoccupied to ask when you’re around him?”

“You shut the fuck up,” Michael hissed irritably but couldn’t find it in himself to yank his wrist back. It felt unreal, like that time his dad had caught him and his long-time buddy Howie fooling around in his room when they had thought no one was home. Howie had been kicked off the freshman football team in town, and they had never spoken again after that.

He had been so pissed off at his fucking dad, but he hadn’t had the guts to stand up to him because he was The Authority. Don’t go against the grain. That’s all he’d ever been taught, for fuck’s sake. Obey the parents and follow God. Listen to the coach. Don’t break the rules unless Coach or Dad says so then go to confession. Say the rosary. Pray for forgiveness. 

Only like girls. Don’t like boys too. 

And Dave Norton was The Authority. Or part of it, at least, and by extension, a part of this group of people who’d approached him with the idea of making his life better by having him set up the only people in his life besides his wife and kids he’d ever fully cared about. 

OK, so maybe he didn’t give two shits about Brad Snider. 

They wanted Lester Crest, and well, Lester was just too intelligent and way more slippery than the slimiest lizard at the FIB. That was already asking for too much trouble, he knew. Lester would figure things out quickly. 

But Trevor Philips? 

“It’s _you_ who cares,” Norton quipped, obviously amused. “You’re the only one who cares.”

His grip on the bottle tightened, and the glass whined, aching at him to just go ahead and break it already. Unleash some anger on _something_. But he shook his head and blew out a calming breath. He wasn’t Trevor, couldn’t do the “living in the moment” or “feed your emotions” bullshit anymore. No, he was getting busy with eating them, instead. “I’m not the only fucking person who cares, so I wish you’d stop saying that,” he ground out. 

Norton leaned back against the booth seat and shrugged. “Almost all of the pieces are together. We’re getting our end ready, so you’d better not get cold feet. This isn’t your wedding.”

Michael shot him a miserable wilting look. “Hey, I didn’t get cold feet there, you asshole.”

Norton smiled, tapping his knee. “No, indeed. You just took a _different_ approach. Better not do that with us, Michael.”

He frowned, the threat duly noted.

The hand that had been tapping the knee patted him on his knee, and it made him feel slightly clammy suddenly instead of being the reassurance he supposed it was meant to bring. Norton’s eyes twinkled brightly, looking awkward and almost downright ghoulish but not quite at the same time in the atmosphere of the restaurant with its gaily strung outdoor-style fairy lights. 

Really, it was just out of place with timing and subject matter. He wanted to think that had they met given any other circumstances, Dave Norton would’ve been a decent man. 

Quirky, but decent...maybe? He wasn’t sure, choosing to shiver instead.

“Look, Michael,” Norton coaxed soothingly like some great earworm that had begun to burrow itself into him, and he felt himself swaying to the words a bit, “it’s late, and your family is probably wondering where you are. We’ll talk more before it’s showtime, so get some rest.” A stray hand gripped his shoulder, massaging the tender flesh there underneath layers of outerwear, and no matter how much he tried to move away, he couldn’t. “Before you know it, all of this snow will be a thing of the past, and you’ll be in sunshine all of the time.”

He practically ran out of the building.

There was no need for sunshine, was there? He had sun and heat in the midst of the snow and cold. There was Trevor. That was the source he’d always flocked to during the deepest, darkest parts of winter where no one else dared to tread. 

And he called out to Michael like a warming beacon in the chill of the night, his body moving towards his hideout without even having to think about the steps it was taking; just knowing it wasn’t moving towards home with the wife and kids, and that would be yet another fight, but he just _had_ to see him. 

He knew Brad wasn’t a good influence. Jesus, _none_ of them were good, but he had always likened himself, Trevor, and Lester to a sort of modern-day Robin Hoods. Banks were insured. People got their money back. The whole system was a fucking joke anyway, of that, Trevor was right. And they were always working themselves toward something bigger and better -- knocking at the US government’s back door. Readying themselves to rob from the biggest thief in the land. 

Of course, thanks to Lester, they were a revolving door of pieces to a big puzzle for whatever the jobs needed, but the constants had remained Lester, Trevor, himself, and Brad. Moses had even pulled out after having a come-to-Jesus moment of sorts after a job-gone-wrong caused by Brad’s own carelessness, and the latter had never once offered an ounce of apology or a hint of regret. It had just been “that’s the nature of the game,” and of course, Trevor had grunted his agreement, so Michael hadn’t pushed the matter further. 

Of course, he’d bitched to Norton. How chummy those two had gotten had been one of his first concerns along with the rampant drug use around the kids. The minute Amanda had told Trevor to knock it off, he had turned on her like a dog snapping on its master--

No, no… _no_ , he didn’t want to go there with the same terms Norton had used, but Trevor just wasn’t himself anymore. And his hatred and depression seemed especially fixated on Amanda to the point in which she no longer allowed him at the house.

Maybe the final straw that had made him even entertain these discreet evening chats with Norton which made him feel scummy like a cheating lover -- and oh ho ho, the irony in that wasn’t lost on him, thank fuck -- was the saddening realization and painful hit to his heart that his _own children_ were too worried to have their formerly precious Uncle T around. They wanted him to get help. 

There was no getting help for Trevor though was what no one understood. 

He’d always been a ticking time bomb, a beautiful bright sun on the verge of going supernova. Stupidly, maybe innocently, he’d thought he could harvest that raw energy and help Trevor use it for something good, but there were just too many variables in life. 

Brad Snider was such a fucking variable. 

No, he wasn’t stupid. He _knew_ things, heard rumors, tried to ignore because he didn’t want to think things about the person he _thought_ he knew, loved with all of his heart. Brad loved drugs too, wanted to expand out, but he wasn’t just into selling to turnt-out old junkies and calling it a day, _no_ ; he sold to teens. He was dangerously close to selling to Michael’s _own kids,_ which was probably an effort to push his fucking buttons, and he had succeeded. 

And the fat fuck had just yucked it up in that annoying squeal of his, saying they’d learn sooner or later because everyone does, and they’d already come from addict parents. He’d been so close to slitting that fuckwad’s throat but had stopped and could only blame his upbringing and the whole misbegotten code of “honor amongst thieves” that kept him from doing it.

Or maybe it was because Trevor had been passed out in a corner on a stained mattress, naked and tangled between the sheets, looking thinner than he could ever remember, and he’d wondered briefly if Trevor would be mad at him for killing Brad. It was something he hadn’t wanted to chance. 

But he had left Brad with a nasty shiner that day that he still hadn’t explained to Trevor, and thankfully, neither had Brad. It had come after he had stared at Trevor’s prone form for way too long, remembering how beautiful he had been when they’d first met despite the leftover scars he’d acquired from a youth filled with abuse, and the scars were still there now but ached brighter on his paler emaciated body. 

It had filled him with sadness, but there was no denying that Trevor would never _not_ be beautiful. 

And then Brad had saddled up beside him, touching him like they were old buddies sharing a sick secret, and whispered cockily in his ear, “His ass looks all nice and fucked there, doesn’t it? Too bad he only calls out for you.”

That’s when Michael had seen red. And hadn’t been back. 

Until now. 

He stood outside the battered building that had served as the hideout and base of operations for whatever the fuck Brad and Trevor were getting up to. A quick look around didn’t turn up Brad’s clunker of a fucking Ford which was a blessing, but he gnawed his lower lips with worry, wondering if maybe Trevor was gone too, and this was a mistake.

But it didn’t feel like one. A small lamp was on inside, and the unmistakable stink of Trevor was all over the place. He just knew he was here, somehow. Playing Trevor had come as easy to him as playing football, and something screamed out at him that maybe, just _maybe_ , that wasn’t right, but it just simply _was_. 

Knocking produced no response, but Trevor was never one for answering the goddamn thing these days, in any case, so he tested the door and found it unlocked. He snorted dismissively and rolled his eyes; Brad _would_ be a stupid fucking asshole just like that, leaving things wide open. The same stupid asshole had always poked fun at Lester’s complete obsessiveness -- and yes, _perhaps_ borderline paranoia -- about security measures and safeguards, calling him anal about such shit. He’d insisted that “staying in plain sight was sometimes the best safety” which sounded like it came from some bad Stallone film, he swore to God, but he always managed to keep his opinions to himself. 

Brad was going to get Trevor killed--

And then he remembered and pursed his lips, bile and stomach acid creeping up his throat along with bits of chips and crappy salsa and skunky cheap beer, and he barely bent over in time to puke them onto the concrete beneath his feet. 

He spat the remainder out and wiped his mouth sullenly, then threw the door open before calling out, “Trevor?”

There was just a need to hear his voice, his mind told him. He needed to think about what he was doing, to think about how final this was. There was no taking this back. Norton had told him as much. He couldn’t fuck around with this. His family was at stake. He was at stake. 

“Mikey?” a voice called out weakly from the room where the light was fizzling out, occasionally blinking off and then back to life with a strange crackling sound. 

_He_ was at stake. His sun was winking out. 

His feet shambled towards the source as they always had since that very day long ago when that same heat had sent a solitary flare ripping through time to save his life. Had he ever remembered to thank him for that? Had he always been so selfish in all of their actions together or had there just never been time for it? There was another job to fulfill, another place to be, a party to fuck around at, snort this, drink that, smoke up, pop one, and it had become an endless rush. 

He was getting too old for it all. Trevor was getting too old for it all, but he was too stubborn to see it for what it was. 

Gilded Apollo was laying on the same stained mattress as if he’d never left, draped in sheets and covers with spots of undeterminable origin, and he could only hope that they were food or at the very least, were Trevor’s own bodily fluids, but it was hard telling where the damn covers had even made their way from, or if they’d just been in the sad-sack building when it had been put back into use. Trevor was a “waste not, want not” kind of guy. Unfortunately, sometimes. 

He moved towards him and basked in his glow, could feel the warmth radiating from him even though he stood a full five feet from the bed. “I’m here, T.”

The fallen sun god drew himself under the mass of clouds surrounding him on the makeshift bed. “Why the fuck are you even here,” he mumbled from underneath. “The warden will have your dick if you aren’t back in your cell soon.”

He tried to keep his temper in check, the need to keep stringing Trevor along be damned. They were too old for this shit, really too old to act like fucking stupid ass kids. He could smell this for what it was: typical hurt Trevor lashing out. 

Well, fuck. He supposed he had a right to be hurt. They hadn’t really spoken in about five weeks. He hadn’t been by here since the night of the coldcocking to Brad’s sneering face which had been about three weeks prior. 

When had things gotten this bad? 

He settled for a small laugh. “Hey, she doesn’t always have me by the balls. I just came to check up on you because I...I’m worried, OK?” He inched towards him, preparing himself for prostration if need be. “Can’t I miss you?” 

He didn’t mean it to come out as a whisper, but his vocal cords just wouldn’t comply no matter how much he tried. Everything else came out like half-hearted moans and grunts as if he’d temporarily gained muteness over a set of words. 

But the room stayed overcast. Even the shitty lamp hadn’t popped back to life, as if it shared a hivemind with its gloomy master. “You tell me. You’ve told me I can’t miss something I don’t even have.” An amber eye peeked out from behind the stained mass of clouds and glared at him condemnatorily. “So tell me, Michael, how does it feel?”

Fuck, he _wanted_ , no, _really needed_ , to be angry right now, but for whatever, well, he really didn’t know. How could he be mad at the truth? He could recall saying real shitty masterpieces as such when he was drunk and depressed. Hell, he did it to Amanda all of the goddamn time. 

And then he laughed.

Trevor’s head poked out of the covers curiously. “What the fuck is so funny?”

Deciding he no longer gave a fuck about whatever Petri dish assortment of bacteria was on the mattress -- because it hadn’t killed Trevor yet, _right_? -- he plopped down and moved towards Trevor with an understanding gleam in his eye. “You think Amanda is set on some fucking pedestal high above you as if I treat you two any differently. She and I fight. You and I fight. Trevor, I’m just always going to be a cold insufferable bastard to be around. I was raised as a _Catholic_ , for fuck’s sake. All we _know_ is suffering and penance.” His hands removed the filth and cloudy covers from his golden sun god, and he hugged him to him gently, careful with his fragility. “I’m cold, Trevor, and I need you to warm me up, please.” His lips rushed in to melt into the molten gold that was Trevor’s. “Please, I need you. I need you to show me that you’re still there inside, Trevor.” He peppered him with kisses, stroking a fine fire that elicited a roar from the golden god before him, and he was both excited and fearful.

Would he get the golden boy of his youth who’d run and laughed and played alongside him? Dreamed big fantastical dreams that were the dreams of harebrained youth who’d known no better?

Or would he get the fiery new god who’d raised like a dark phoenix out of the ashes; scary, beautiful, and untamed? Ready to take over and lay waste to all in his path?

Two confused honey-colored eyes stared into his, and Michael was taken back to that day all of those years ago when they’d met over flare guns, unplanned extras, and dust trails. “Mikey? I...I don’t understand. The...the stuff...Brad said we gotta test the stuff...I...I’m still here.” A fine dusting of red colored his cheeks, and he cleared his throat. “I didn’t mean anything by it, OK? Just forget what I said.”

Michael laid him back against the mattress, preparing to worship him. It had been so long, and even though everything inside of his head that was Catholic, his parents, his upbringing, and hell, even the FIB very much revolted and screamed at what he was about to do, the parts of him that were all _truly_ Michael Townley hummed like a finely-tuned piano that had yearned to play this song again, and they thanked him. He needed this, he needed to warm up in the godforsaken cold that was North Yankton, and the only way to do it was the eternal sunshine that had been at his side, and he had to do it before that star would wink out because he knew it was coming. 

Beautiful stars weren’t meant long for this universe. 

He looked in Trevor’s slowly fading eyes and loved him, cared for him, breathed life into him the only way he knew how. 

“Warm me up, Trevor. I’m so cold.”

And Trevor, to his credit, looked at him warily but slowly raised an arm and invited him under the blankets. “It was you who gave Brad that black eye, wasn’t it.” It wasn’t even a question. He just knew. 

Michael didn’t even hesitate. “He deserved it. I’d do it again.” He trailed kisses down Trevor’s stomach and twirled his tongue around his belly button, enjoyed listening to him groan with wanton rage and innocent desire, still unsure which side he’d wind up with in the end. He could understand why Trevor gained satisfaction in playing with fire, but he, himself, could only get as close as this to doing the actual practice. “He doesn’t get to fuck around with what’s mine.”

Trevor perked up, raised up on his elbows. “How’s that now? Yours? I haven’t been yours in how long?” His eyes narrowed, and he tried to shrink away from Michael, but Michael held fast. “This is more of your head game bullshit, I swear to--”

He looked Trevor in the eyes and saw every bit of the scared young manchild with no direction he’d still been when they’d met, locked gazes with the same loyal lover whose passion was like trying to love a raging fire and was often the very thing he needed to melt away the ice from around his soul, shared memories with the man who’d become his best friend, brother, and partner in more ways than one.

And exchanged parting glances with the person who’d grown closer to Brad Snider because he’d felt forsaken by his friend, the person he loved, all because that person didn’t know how to tell the truth to people or to _his own damn self_. 

Trevor was many things, and he _was_ capable of some pretty shitty things, but he _knew_ Trevor. There was a reason to his madness. He did have some rules that he operated within which is how they had managed to work together for so long. 

But he couldn’t make anyone else understand Trevor because the man _just didn’t care_ to be understood by anyone other than his mother and Michael Townley. 

“You’ve always been mine, baby,” Michael said firmly as he softly took Trevor’s weeping cock into his hands. “And to tell you the truth, the _real_ truth, you can miss something you don’t have. I miss you so much every day.”

* * *

He almost let it slip that he’d miss him always. Jesus Christ, how was he supposed to go through with the fucking plan now that he knew that it was just Trevor being Trevor, following along without much direction? Doing shit because he missed _him_? God, he hated himself so fucking much. Was it possible for a person to hate themselves this much? If it was, it existed within a man named Michael Townley’s soul. And God had to hate him twice over. 

Norton had called him again to remind him that there was no backing out, and he’d told him again that he wasn’t getting cold feet, that this wasn’t his fucking wedding -- that had thrown Amanda for a loop because she’d been in the goddamn room when that conversation had transpired, and he was still scratching his head over how to explain the meaning behind _that_ certain turn of the phrase -- and had assured him that soon they’d all be traipsing about sunny Los Santos without another thought about North Yankton, snow, the old times, or Trevor Philips ever again.

Well, probably most of them. 

Mandy had noticed he was drinking more and more as the weeks went by, and she had asked him, point-blank, if he was having second thoughts. She’d always been good at reading his body language. Or half the male populations, for that matter. He tried not to hold it against her since he had his little secrets too, but Trevor had helped him to realize that his problem with everything was that he liked being the one in control of what was going on and who was being fucked. He didn’t like it when someone else took that from him. “A typical repressed Catholic,” Trevor had so lovingly called him once.

Trevor….

He found himself in front of his door, or what consisted of a door for their rundown shack, again, and he knew it wasn’t right. It was like trying to make up time with a beloved ailing pet before putting it down. Even Trevor knew something was up because he was just that observant, but he was so starved for affection that he ignored his gut feelings just to feel something close to old times. 

God, Michael felt so _fucking shitty_. 

Trevor’s head currently rested in Michael’s lap, who sat smoothing the coarser strands of hair while also contemplating about what to do with the FIB mess and Trevor. He was at a loss of what to do. 

He regarded the sleeping man in his lap. At rest, Trevor looked so much more youthful and at peace than his years gave off. He knew that if he gave at least half a rat’s ass at trying to maintain his mustache and run a comb through his waning hair, he’d look better, but it had been a battle they’d fought over the years. 

He was struck with a strong desire to protect him, but it wasn’t the same as with Amanda. He knew Trevor could fight for himself, but there was something buried deep within him, like a lost little child, that cried out sometimes. They cried out to each other, only understood each other. 

And it was that which kept him and Trevor circling around each other like broken satellites in the night. 

A crusty amber eye slowly opened and darted around, taking in its surroundings before settling on Michael. The mouth that accompanied it yawned not so gracefully. “I was pretty fucking sure you were gone.”

“And why would that be?” Michael countered with a hint of amusement in his voice. 

Trevor stretched in such a feline way, it made Michael grin and reach out to stroke his belly, but his hand was batted away. The man stuck his tongue out and shrugged. “Because you always leave at the first sign of intimacy. Ask Amanda.”

And what _could_ have been a pleasant morning screwed his face up into a look of wretchedness as if Michael had swallowed some of that fucking gasoline Trevor was always sniffing when he thought no one was looking. “Fucking _Christ_ , Trevor, why the fuck would you want to bring _her_ name up, for God’s sake? And there are _no_ intimacy problems with Amanda, you asshole.”

“Not talking about sex, killer. Is that all you men think about?”

Michael hung his head while Trevor guffawed like a hyena on cocaine. He was supposed to spend his last remaining week preparing for Ludendorff with Brad and this fucknut. Lester had already done what he was going to do, but he’d bowed out without really specifying why. The looks he’d shot Michael had given him all he’d needed to know though. Jesus, as if he hadn’t felt bad enough. He’d always genuinely considered Lester a friend. 

Who was _really_ the bad guy here? He’d wondered that more than once. Probably wouldn’t be the last time either. He was already having problems sleeping. He’d begun to have nightmares a few weeks back but was trying to keep those under wraps. The last thing he needed was anyone getting tipped off as to what was actually going on. 

The changes in Trevor had happened over the past two weeks, ever since he’d come to stay. He’d started out a shell of his former existence, fucked up on whatever Brad was feeding and injecting into him, and yeah, Brad was probably making him feel great and masking the pain, but he wasn’t loving him, so Michael had taken on that daunting task, trying to nourish him with actual food, kindness, and real love...and Trevor had begun to take root and sprout back like a flower, growing on the thaw produced from what had leaked out from Michael’s cold heart. His roots had lapped it up like he’d been thirsting for that affection his whole life. 

And he probably had. 

Then mistakes were made. Michael had fallen in love with him all over again. And was very close to calling the whole thing off, even if it meant his life. 

But then Brad had started pumping Trevor full of shit again, and Trevor ate it up like a kid in a candy store, claiming he needed the rush to do this job. He’d need to be prepared. And Michael reminded him they’d never needed it back in the old days, back before Brad, and for a minute, he’d seen a glimpse of that fiery red phoenix in Trevor’s eyes as they’d glistened with burning rage while he’d insisted that he needed it, _thank you very much, you are not his goddamn father, Mikey_. 

He couldn’t save Trevor, and it was eating at him inside. He couldn’t do it, he couldn’t kill someone who was just messed up inside. They weren’t so different. Flip a coin, and he’d be the one they’d want dead.

He couldn’t kill someone he...loved. The boy who’d saved his miserable life that wasn’t worth saving. He loved him more than he loved himself. 

* * *

Trevor paced back and forth not unlike an angry beast for the sixth time that day. Michael had lost count of how many times Trevor’d taken a hit of the pipe, but he’d smelled the tell-tell sign of the plasticness between him and Brad multiple times, of that he was sure. His nose wrinkled in distaste. 

“Trevor.”

The pacing stopped. “What.”

A crazy idea hit him earlier while he’d been dreaming about Trevor’s death for probably the hundredth time that week. The notion was foolish, especially in the presence of fools who didn’t suffer the concept of romance, but he tried anyway. Thank fuck Brad was outside. “What if...what if we just left?”

His long-time friend looked at him curiously and started to laugh but then thought better of it. “Is this a joke, Mikey?”

“No, it’s not,” he sighed. Fuck, why the hell had he even bothered? But he was knee-deep in shit anyway, so may as well trudge further into it. “I’m saying, uh, what if you and I just left? Like what if we just up and left and went somewhere else? Start over?”

“With no Amanda?” 

Why the fuck was he so angry about the idea of no Amanda? “Of course not. Why the hell would I bring her along?”

“What about the kids??” He wanted to feel better about Trevor’s answer because even though his ties towards Amanda only extended as far as “mother of precious Townley children” where she was concerned, Michael was still stuck with this pit in his stomach that was definitely several bleeding ulcers by now. “Besides Michael, what the fuck has gotten into you? This is getting us closer to the Big One, to our dreams, man. Isn’t this what it’s all about? Think about all of this money, Mikey. What you can do for the kids.”

His blue eyes cast to the ground in shame. Even still, Trevor was thinking about him. “I...I don’t think I can do this shit anymore, Trev. I’m getting too old.” His weary gaze fell back up on Trevor’s burning one. “It’s too much, too fast. It’s not fun like it was when we were young.”

A wild mishmash of emotion fell over Trevor’s face, and it was hard to get a read on any of it, but at the end of it all was a very damning cruelty which reminded him of his own father, and maybe it was reminiscent of the forever-gone Mr. Philips that had abandoned Trevor in his childhood. “What the fuck, Michael! It’s a fucking job, it’s not meant to be all fun and fucking games! The small-time shit we did when we were kids was two fucks with snot on their noses who could barely hold up a kid for lunch money, much less do some of the shit we’ve pulled off in recent years. You’re always bitching about growing up, and well, dumbass, this is the big time! We’ve grown up! You can’t back out now!!”

As he watched Trevor huff and puff, blowing spittle onto the floor, he was humbled by the realization that he was right, of course. He couldn’t back out. 

His family was counting on him.

Dave Norton and the FIB were counting on him.

Trevor was counting on him.

He had managed to fuck up Trevor over the years with his own failed repressions and shortcomings, mismanaging his feelings and not understanding others. Not long ago, he’d told Trevor that he needed to grow up, and now here he was getting it thrown back in his face, well-deserved. 

Didn’t Trevor deserve a new start too? Away from everyone who was using and abusing him? 

God, even if it would hurt Michael, he’d do anything to save Trevor, and he’d take his secrets with him to the grave. 

The cold feeling was back, his sun was dying, but he wasn’t going to let it supernova, not when he held the keys to save his Apollo. 

He texted Norton and let him know that preparations were complete, everything for Ludendorff was a go. He said that he didn’t get cold feet. 

But when Dave had said he’d taken another approach that day on his wedding, he was correct. He _had_ by taking Trevor as a mistress of sorts, so while Amanda had suspected he was fucking all sorts of other women, he was in the arms of the only other miserable bastard on the planet who understood him. 

It was funny how often life repeated itself: he was about to take another approach in the form of Brad being the one to eat a bullet. Trevor would have his freedom one way or another, so help him. 


End file.
